WCL Newsletter Vol. II - issue VII Friday, February 15th, 2008
	In this Issue: Thanks for joining WCL Titled players challenge you ! Live on WCL Prizes Tournament & QR Highlights Dasher - Tip of the week WCL : The Community Past issues

For a limited time, new members to World Chess Live can get their first six months for the price of three. That's just $14.97 for your first half-year. Add accounts for additional family members for just $2.97 each! Click the SIGN UP button to get started or just download the software and register from there.

Already have an online chess account, but interested in transferring your account to World Chess Live? We'd love to have you. Then transfer your account. Or just:          Existing World Chess Live members looking to renew your membership? Renew my existing membership.

Titled players challenge you ! If you want to see your name in the NewsLetter, it is VERY easy : just play the Events and win! Played this week Some results of the week   Keep an on the scheduled Events, connect in time, then, jump in!  On Dasher, click in menu bar - Window - Activities then select the Events tab. That is where you find most of the info about... guess what... EVENTS ! Under (To)day Events, you find scheduled events, MasterChallenge, Simul, etc. But also the live games that are broadcasted. Under them are the "tomorrow events" as far there is no last minute change. But above the Today Events, there is a line name "scheduled events with titled players this week" and it opens a webpage.  vs is becoming the usual time control for Master Challenge but, for people over 2000, the time control is 1 0 1 0.   So, for players who have a provisional rating in bullet, MasterChallenge will take in consideration their rating average in other sections. Masters have more fun to play that way and chances for players to win are greater so... everybody is happy !  Let's see the results of the week: Thursday, february 7th | 10:00 EST  IM Gergely Szabo was on the field! 15 wins, losses to DuncanBape, MaryDawson x 3 and RdgMx. Thursday, february 7th | 15:00 EST  GM Viktor Gavrikov with a time control of 1 1 vs 2 1 won his 16 games. Friday February 8th | 15:00 EST  IM Dragan Stamenkovic played 20 games, winning 19 and losing one to YoNoSe. Friday February 8th | 19:00 EST  GM Larry Christiansen played Piece-Odds MasterChallenge 19 games, 19 wins. What else? Saturday February 9th | 09:00 EST  IM Goran Vojinovic played a 1 1 vs 2 1 MasterChallenge, as a warm-up for his MasterChallenge for a lesson started last thursday. 15 wins and only one loss to DuncanBape Saturday, February 9th | 15:00 EST  GM Alex Finkel was supposed to play a DoubleTrouble but, since he forgot to pay his electricity bill, he lost connection at the end of the first hour. The actual result was 14 wins, 1 draw to YoNoSe and 4 losses to the feminine Crushing-Master Team of MaryDawson x2 (did I spell it correctly, there?) and Lena x2 . Sunday, February 10th | 09:00 EST  FM Dragan Drasko met twice Marydawson in his MasterChallenge, guess the result! Dragan won 14 other games and lost to YoNoSe and DarrellMac2. Monday, February 11th | 15:00 EST  GM Arthur chatted during a full hour but found enough time to play 22 games, losing to MaryDawson 2, MarcoC, TekAjao, Lena and coolbreis. MasterChallenge given by Arthur are always entertaining. It's nice to meet a GM who plays for fun. Monday, February 11th | 19:00 EST  IM Branimir Maksimovic played 21 games in the MasterChallenge. One loss to VAIBHAVBHAT, one draw to TGRUN but, newcomer on RdgMx both drew and win during this event.  IM Branimir Maksimovic is often connected on the server and you can follow him or even challenge him. Wednesday, February 13th | 15:00 EST  IM Gergely Szabo played 22 games in his MasterChallenge, result 15 wins, losses to RdgMx x2, Lena, nixen, MaryDawson, VAIBHAVBHAT, coolbreis), and one draw for RdgMx. Wednesday, February 13th | 19:00 EST  GM Alex Finkel played a long DoubleTrouble 42 games and 31wins, congrats to the winners: Lena, BRock, damianabramson, Predestinedpawn x2, darrellmac2, GUNSMOKE, Goran, McKnights, playwaycool, omarchesab. Thanks to all the players, Members and Masters, and Congratulations to the Winners. Rules and descriptions of all Titled Events can be found here Banter played this week:  During the 25 5 game, the two Masters whisper their thoughts and their plans. Of course, they can't read what their opponent is planning. Always interesting to try to understand how a Master thinks!  When the game finishes, the players review the game together, exploring other lines and analyzing their mistakes. GM Dejan Antic vs FM Dr. Stamenkovic ½ - ½ GM Ronen Har-Zvi vs GM Dejan Antic 1 - 0 These games have been recorded with the player's comments and can be rebroadcasted on demand.  TGIF This Friday evening, (Feb. 1), Dragan was facing Dragan! IM Dragan Stamenkovic vs FM Dragan Drasko. That was the revenge of last week TGIF in which Dragan won. But, this time Dragan was better prepared and drew 6-6. No doubt that next time Dragan will win (or may be draw again... only way to know about it is to be present and enjoy that weekly battle).  Simul Results  Don't miss the registration! To make sure you'll be warned of the beginning of the registration for the simul, just do "tell simulbot alarm". Beware, that is a toggle command, so, if you send the command twice, that will switch the alarm off. Saturday, February 9th | 19:00 EST   IM Martha Fierro played as usual a Simul on Saturday evening but we shortened the Time Control to 25 15 and reduced the maximum players to 12. This way, the Simul was full and short enough to let Martha analyze deeply 2 of the games, Skwerly's and RobertBancod's.  Twelve players joined and 12 wins.  We wish Good Luck to IM Martha Fierro who plays in Cappelle-la-Grande, France and will be missing for the 2 coming weeks. Tuesday, February 12th | 19:00 EST  GM Ronen Har-Zvi gave his simul to 8 players and analysed in a typed lecture the game he played vs McKnights. He won 7 games and drew one. Tuesday, February 12th | 15:00 EST  GM Larry Christiansen played the tuesday Pieces-Odds MasterChallenge.  Not that easy, for once, as he lost to frank001 and drew to Korsten. Have fun on the board! Of course, only members can play, so become a member!  In Pieces odds, the master will suffer the handicap of a piece determined by your blitz rating despite the rating displayed is your wild rating. The time control is 2 0 2 0. The limits can be adjusted and are not always the same, even for the same Master. For example:  U1200 Queen down  U1400 Rook on a file missing  U1650 Bishop on c file missing  U1850 kNight on b file missing  U2200 f pawn missing  Above?... well... show us you deserve your rating ;-) Site Pro : GM Yuri Solodovnichenko   GM Yuri Solodovnichenko was born 1978 and became a Grand Master in January 2007. He actually lives in Kherson, Ukraine and you can find more details on his FIDE card here. Current rating 2541.  About his style: I am very agressive - 1.e4 by White, Sicilian and Benko Gambit by Black are my favorites. But sometimes I like to switch for much more quiet openings (Petroff, QGA) or try something offbeat (1.e4 Nc6!?).  Some results : 1st place in Rochefort, France, 2003 and 2005; shared 1st place in Hamburg, Germany, 2005; 3rd place in Voronezh, Russia, 2006; 1st place in Chambery, France, 2006; shared 1st place in Rodatychi, Ukraine, 2006  "My peak was in 2006 - beginning of 2007 when I made significant progress in quality of my play and increased my ELO till 2585. Now I suffer some crisis but in the nearest future I am ready for new achievements. The very first aim is to enter in the Top-100 list. After this I will re-write current paragraph of my biography :-) .   I am professional chessplayer and my hobbies are: books, movies, football (soccer for US auditory). I like to travel around the world and do this going to play in the tournaments. His wife motivates him to write some chess book, let us hope she will succeed! But for now, he shows his talents on in lots of MasterChallenge but also in BanterChess and TGIF, the famous Friday night's event where 2 titled players fight during one hour in series of 3 0 bullet games (see above the result of the last event). One of the most talentuous and promising players here on  So, don't miss his next event! On , February 24th at 18:00 Server Time, he will play a Banterchess game vs GM Dejan Antic. Events Scheduled This Week (Saturday Feb. 16th, Feb. 24th)  Saturday  10:00 EST MasterChallenge  15:00 EST DoubleTrouble  19:00 EST Simul + analysis  GM Alex Finkel  WGM Anna Zatonskih  GM Dejan Antic  Sunday  14:00 EST MasterChallenge  18:00 EST Battle of the Week  IM Vlado Jakovljevic  GM Ronen Har-Zvi vs  GM Dejan Antic  Monday  15:00 EST MasterChallenge  19:00 EST Simul+Analysis  IM Sasha Belezky  GM Ronen Har-Zvi  Tuesday  15:00 EST MC Pieces-Odds  19:00 EST MasterChallenge  GM Vitali Golod  IM Branimir Maksimovic  Wednesday  15:00 EST MasterChallenge  19:00 EST DoubleTrouble  GM Arthur Kogan  GM Alex Finkel  Thursday  10:00 EST MasterChallenge  15:00 EST MasterChallenge  19:00 EST BanterChess  IM Goran Vojinovic + PRIZE (see below)  WGM Anna Zatonskih  IM Goran Vojinovic vs  IM Gergely Szabo  Friday  15:00 EST Lecture  19:00 EST MC Pieces-Odds  20:00 EST TGIF  GM Larry Christiansen  GM Larry Christiansen  FM Dragan Drasko vs  IM Dragan Stamenkovic  Saturday  10:00 EST MasterChallenge  15:00 EST DoubleTrouble  19:00 EST Simul + analysis  GM Viktor Gavrikov  GM Victor Mikhalevski  IM Miodrag Perunovic  Sunday  14:00 EST MasterChallenge  18:00 EST Battle of the Week  GM Daniel Fridman  GM Yuri Solodovnichenko vs  GM Dejan Antic   Live on World Chess Live   Good Bye Corus! Gibraltar! Moscow! You can still review and examine some of the games that were broadcasted by : "finger Corus08" and examine them on dasher. And welcome to Morélia - Linarès Tournament  This week, Feb. 14, the Morelia/Linares tournament begins. Don't miss that event on and watch the eight top GM battling in the first part of that super tournament. Are present : Vishy Anand (India), Veselin Topalov (Bulgaria), Alexei Shirov (Spain), Peter Leko (Hungary), Vassily Ivanchuk (Ukraine), Levon Aronian (Armenia), Teimour Radjabov (Azerbaijan) and Magnus Carlsen (Norway).  The Mexican part runs 14-23 February in Morelia, with the second part running February 28 - 8 March in Linarès where, originally the tournament was created and held.  The relay team will provide you, in collaboration with ICC a live coverage of this really great event. You will have access, to ICC Chess.FM's commentaries by Mig Greengard & Macauley Peterson (whose daily video report will be available on ICC webpage. The team is composed of GM like Joel Benjamin, Ronen Har-Zvi, Larry Christiansen, Nick De Firmian and John Fedorowicz.  On Friday 15th, 16:30 EST, our Simulgiver GM Ronen Har-Zvi will be the first to comment.  GM Larry Christiansen, an other of our famous and popular SitePro will take the Mig-rophone to give his spin and advices on the games. No doubt his humour will add to the pleasure we have to watch the event.  As for Corus lately and all major events, a Game-of-the-Day (GOTD) video will be done each day and you can find it (thanks to ICC) in the event windows. For those who have never take a look at it, you will be amazed by the quality of this lecture/analysis.   In case anyone is wondering, Morelia is famous for its butterfly preserve parking area - and quite a sight it is too!  GET READY for Morélia-Linarès Tournament!  Tune-in at 16:30 EST and ENJOY!

Highlights

Events with Prize by IM Goran Vojinovic Starting Thursday, February 14th at 10:00 EST  During February and March 2008, IM Goran Vojinovic will offer a weekly MasterChallenge in the early afternoon, (european time). Among the players who will play him, the best winner will be awarded by a free lesson given by IM Goran Vojinovic.  The Serbian International Master is actually rated 2474 and could beat his previous peak (2482) very soon.  He belongs to those who believe in WCL and wants to help the site to develop in Europ.  The dates are not yet determined, so keep an eye on WCL events and don't give away the chance to get free lesson from a great teacher! Result of Thursday, February 14th : 16 wins and one draw to FM DirkVanDooren, so the winner of the free lesson is NO_PLAYER. Better luck next Thursday ! Rules : the games will be played in 2 0 2 0 time control. In case of several losses, the best winner will be determined this way 1st tiebreak: The player who won the most games in that MasterChallenge. 2nd tiebreak: The player with the lowest rating. Predict a Move Started since January 1st, PAM (Predict-a-Move) is rolling. Every day at 13:00 EST, you can join the line just type "tell PAM-bot join". The rule is simple. A game played by 2 masters is chosen in a database and the members have to guess what is the move that has been played by white as well as black. Any guess within the 30 first seconds give you 25 points. The right guess gives 75 points, so, the right guess found in less than 30 seconds means 100 points. Of course, it is not allowed to search the game in a database in order to guess(?) the move. We hope you understand that cheating is just detrimental. You can join, leave and come back without losing your points. Here come the names of the top 3 in the PAM played from Thursday, February 7th to Wednesday, February 13th:  Thursday  1. Alstone52 3975 pts  2. Zoraidax 3700 pts  3. ChessLover2 3700 pts  Friday  1. timm 4625 pts  2. ChessLover2 4075 pts  3. Alstone 3825 pts  Saturday  1. Normandbluteau 3200 pts  2. YoNoSe 3050 pts  3. Alstone 2950 pts  Sunday  1. timm 2700 pts  2. Normandbluteau 2675 pts  3. Janos 2400 pts  Monday  1. Alstone52 3175 pts  2. Zoraidax 2700 pts  3. timm 2600 pts  Tuesday  1. EduardoAbramson 4650 pts  2. Yonose 3475 pts  3. ZoranMilenkovic 3425 pts  Wednesday  1. ChessLover2 3650 pts  2. Alstone52 3400 pts  3. timm 3375 pts  Each day, around 20 persons join this events and kibitz their thoughts via PAM-bot. So Join us and have fun!  In case of tiebreak, the system is very simple, it is the registration order which decides, so, be there a the very beginning!   Dasher - Hints and tips    The first thing to do is to make sure you have the latest version, actually 1.1.6. Click on the Help in menu bar and select About Dasher. It will display your actual version and if it does show you the 1.1.6 you have to download here.  Playing is a thing, but chatting is a important part of the life on a site. So, while you are playing, you have 3 options (drop menu at the lower left corner of your board): Say, Kibitz and Whisper. Say is to chat with your opponent, his answer will appear in a separate pop up chat box but you can still type in the line under the board. Kibitz send the text to the audience and to the opponent. Whisper, only to audience. According to the context, for example during a game between titled players, the kibitz will turn automatically in whisper. So read "help say" "help kibitz" "help whisper" to know the different functions. You may also want to focus on your game and not be disturbed, then click on settings icons, plalying2 tab and unmark "received kibitz and whispers" with the submenu "only from titled players". It's a simplified way to access to quietplay command. Read "help quietplay".  Anyway, the channel 1 is there to receive your questions. The "click-way" would be, Help in menu and select Ask a question.  We are here to help you and let you have fun playing chess !    : The Community  We need you ! As already said above, is growing ! We need Helpers, we need more Tournament managers, so if you like chess and if you enjoy to help people to play chess and give them fun in playing in the best conditions, apply for Helper and/or for Tournament Manager. Go in Event Tab of the Activities Window and, at the bottom, you'll find the forms to fill. Don't forget that thing : if you are friendly with people, people will be friendly with you (well... almost !) You can also click on "I want to become a Helper" or on "I want to be a Tournament Manager"  Feel free to share your opinion and your wishes. We want to know what kind of event you like, in tourneys, in event vs titled players. We also need to know what is the best hour for you (of course, regarding where you live in the world) and how much time you can spend on for an event. You can find the list of scheduled events, tourneys and broadcast of the coming week in the event window .   Well, we need to know who you are and where you are from in order to schedule the right events at the right time. Questions and some answers: Solution : It seems that the puzzle submitted in the issue dated January, 25th was more difficult than I thought. 1.Bc1 d6 (only move) 2.Rd2!! Kf4 (only move) and finally 3.Rd4 # with a double check. Wild : Atomic chess will is back with the release 1.2.0 of Dasher actually under testing. Coming with it an other wild is back : the Two Kings. To know more about the rules of those two popular wild, type "help wild". Ask your Tournament Manager in channel 221 to set up Atomic or any other wild tourney! Tournament with Prizes : is holding prizes tournaments. Some of them are announced in the newsletter but not all. So the better way to check when they are is to connect on the site and, in events Window (windows-activities-events) and click on the list of the scheduled tournament which is updated. Guests : You have dowloaded Dasher and you can actually plays vs the computer when you are not connected but, if you want to play on line, you must be a member. Log in as a guest just allows you to ask questions. In case of problem to validate your membership, password lost, please contact . Games of the day / Videos : they are available for members only (so join us !) with your and password handle. Mac / Linux :I adore the dasher program but I can't downloaded with my Mac OS X 10.5.1 and sadly I only play with it in my laptop. There is an alternative interface to Dasher for people who chosed Mac or Linux, its called Sonia. Time Control : Set up a game with time control like 40 moves in 60 minutes + extra time like on an OTB is possible when the game is in tourney mode, so you may need a Admin Tournament Manager to do it. What time is it ? : On , the events refers to the Server Time EST (New-York time), that is GMT-5 or PST+3. To check the Server Time (and see if your didn't forget to have lunch) you can type /Date in main tab and see the server time.  Two important addresses : If you have any suggestions, ideas or questions, feel free to contact us. We will give you a personal answer or publish it in this part if many of you are concerned by a topic. We collect also infos regarding members of . If you have played a tourney OTB, if your club organizes an event or anything else, we can mention it. Some of you may have questions relatives to login, lost password, membership then contact support. We answer as soon we receive your mail.

© Copyright 2007-2008 Internet Chess Club, Inc. All Rights Reserved.           World Chess Live, World Chess Network, and Chess Live are trademarks of Internet Chess Club, Inc.